Small town girl with big world vision
Imagine you are coaching a Little League team. There’s a lot of things you need to track—the batter at the plate, the play in the field, the kids wriggling in the dugout. You look over to the bench and see Kid #1 spitting sunflower seeds at Kid #2. You explicitly told them not to spit…
I can’t believe that it’s been ten years since this sweet face came into my life and changed my whole world. A decade of loving this child is more than I ever thought that I would get, and I often think about how the trajectory of my life would be so different without Little Man…
Grace abounds every day. But sometimes we miss it. Instead of seeing grace, we see our own shortcomings. Instead of seeing growth, we see how far there is yet to travel. Instead of having a burden lifted, we are weighed down in our own failings. If we live like that, we miss far more than…
Today, we all cried. Little Man cried because he felt exhausted negotiating this new relationship. Sunshine cried because she missed her friends and family and America is so different. I cried because after a really difficult day, I tried to bless the kids by making “chocolate popcorn” and failed miserably. Who knew chocolate popcorn is…
The boys have both realized that this time is almost over. For both of them, it was seeing the affirmation paper chain, once strung so gaily from one bedpost to the other, now hanging forlornly straight down. They count the loops each day. Taking one off becomes a slower process. We all count our moments…
Little Man’s birthday was today. He turned nine. I know that’s not a “big” birthday to most people, but to me it was huge. For the past several years, I’ve been struggling with the fear that my son would not be here for his ninth birthday. I don’t have any specific reason I felt that…
“Mama, Mama, come quick!” The boys had been out on a bike ride and came scrambling back in after five minutes. They were both frantic. Panic in their eyes. “Come! Come!” Soccer Boy shouted and mimed the twitching of a wounded animal. Oh, Lord. It was a bird. A starling. Likely clipped by a car. …
This Fourth of July, we celebrated with a special kind of red, white and blue: red bloody knees, white bandages, and blue bruises. They even worked it so that they each wrecked the same knee within fifteen minutes of one another. Little Man crashed his bike, but Soccer Boy’s injury was a little more complicated…
Imagine you are at your local pool. You see your friend across the way, beckoning to you, then pointing to the snack bar. Yes! A snack. So you look for the shortest distance to get there…through the pool. Perfect! A refreshing dip on your way to a treat. You head to the water. *Tweet!!!* A…
I hate bananas. I mean hate them. I can smell someone eating a banana across a cafeteria and it can ruin my lunch. I would never willingly touch one if I can help it. And the sound that they make when someone is eating one…it sounds….moist. And mushy. And all together disgusting. The only other…
